Wilder Weather

As a writing dabbler, I am finally doing the thing that I’ve been saying I was going to do for almost 10 years.

I’m writing a book. The Book. Maybe the first of many books.

I can carve out an hour here, a half hour there, to write. But not being a full-time writer, it is hard to find those longer blocks of time for deep concentration. My brain covets the scenic quiet and expert guidance of a true writing retreat – held in some beachy or lakeside location, isolated from the world, lightly scheduled, with a mix of writing and coaching. Taking the suggestions of Cathy Mazak and her Facebook group I Should Be Writing, I created my own writing retreat. I can’t replicate the coaching, but I could make up for it with a peaceful space, a block of time, and inspiration from podcasts from the likes of #AmWriting.

For the record, I could not have done this without the encouragement and support of my husband. He knows that I have a book in my heart that’s fighting to see the light of day. He gave me a hall pass from all household duties – in fact, he mandated it during the daytime. No cooking. No laundry. No cleaning up something. He supported putting my butt in the chair and writing. He lifted as much child care load as I was willing to give up, though I did keep my morning ready-time and evening family time free. And he sent me away overnight, because he recognized among Mazak’s suggestions that I needed at least some time away to have the best retreat.

I didn’t want to waste time driving, which aligned perfectly with taking the Amtrak to a destination. Living in Norman, I have access to the Heartland Flyer, which runs daily from Oklahoma City to Fort Worth in the morning and back in the evening. Without much of a destination or sightseeing interest in Fort Worth (great city, but have been there), it was a perfect spot for isolation. I rented a hotel room at the Homewood Suites, precisely because both breakfast and dinner are on site – along with a glass of wine to reward myself if all went well.

Pre-Retreat Preparation: For months, I have been outlining The Book. I had a pretty good sense of what content I wanted to include, at least to begin. The night before the retreat, I opened the outline and gave it a solid look and read, preparing my brain to engage with it.

Retreat Day 1 (Monday): I had some errands to run and chores to do, because we had taken a long weekend trip and I needed to do at least some recovery. Those went faster than I expected, and I had most of the day to write. I brain-dumped some content into two chapters, on topics I had researched and presented the past. 2144 words, which was about double of my goal for the day.

Retreat Day 2 (Tuesday): Some of the content of my book will be drawn from blogs and articles I had already written. I pulled these together from their various sources, then edited them to remove blog-specific references, add content, expand, and blend them into the flow of the chapters. Then I added new content to several chapters. 4548 words, about half of which were new and half pulled from previous writings. Damn proud of that word count.

Retreat Day 3 (Wednesday): Because I had such a jump start on Day 2, I found it a little hard to get started on Day 3. I dabbled in some research in the morning to get the juices flowing, and the words flowed much better from midday through the afternoon. 2802 words.

Retreat Day 4 (Thursday): Took the Amtrak down to Fort Worth. Without internet on the train, I was less distracted and more able to focus. I brought the materials to support a deep-dive focus on one particular chapter, and I knew that the word count would be slower as a result. On the way down, I dove into books to work through deepening the content of that one chapter. Once I got to Fort Worth, I sought a cafe-style restaurant in downtown (walking distance of the train station) where I could get a light bite and sit comfortably for a couple of hours. As I walked deeper into downtown, the crowd thickened, and roads were blocked by a heavy police presence. It turns out I had walked right into the path of the presidential motorcade. I took a seat outdoors (lovely weather) at the Flying Saucer Draught Emporium, which was not exactly what I had in mind. I tried to write – and did, a little – but it was more distracting than I expected. I was essentially killing time until I could check into the hotel. The 2-mile walk to the Homewood Suites took almost 40 minutes. Once I checked in, I pulled the chair and table into a comfortable arrangement and got serious, stopping only to fetch dinner from the lobby and also bring a glass of wine to the refrigerator for later. The work remained research-intensive, though I was able to concentrate mightily and work late. 2592 words.

Retreat Day 5 (Friday): By now, with over 10,000 words, my goalposts had moved to a bigger stretch goal – 16,000 words, or roughly a quarter of a target non-fiction book length. After a quick breakfast down in the lobby, I was back in my comfortable suite. I worked through some sections that will be parallel in each chapter, setting up some framing text and filling in part of that content. I nudged back into the in-depth chapter to round out as much of its content as I could. I stayed in my room through 1:00 PM, the late check-out time that they offered me, and then moved myself to the lobby to continue working in a safe, internet-friendly environment until it was time to Uber back to the train station. I called for the Uber quite a bit early, hoping I’d have a space to write while at the station. That didn’t really work out for me, though I did get several pictures and videos of trains for my 4-year-old rail fan. I boarded the Amtrak as soon as it was allowed and settled in again for dedicated, distraction-free writing. I had reserved the introduction section for the return trip home, and I focused intently on it throughout the journey. I raced to complete what I could get written as the train raced through its stops, reaching my goal about 10 minutes before my home station. 3954 words.

If you’re doing the math, the total word count for the week was 16,040. By the end of the week, I felt like a wrung-out washcloth. I had given everything I had available for the book. It was time to set the cloth back down to marinate again, to let the juices return so that they can flow later.

I can write over a thousand words in an hour, if I have a topic at hand and something to say about it. I just did, with this post. Well-researched content takes longer, and the deeper I dive into this book, the slower the words will come as I dig deeper into research and into less familiar corners of the subject. Bit by bit, I will build this book. The one-week retreat provided not just a foundation, but a rough-in of the floor plan and some interior structure. Board by board, tile by tile, wire by wire, this book is under construction. Stay tuned!

Here we are, finally, on the 35th day and at the end of this longest federal government shutdown in history. Let’s hope it holds the record forever and that it really was the shutdown to end all shutdowns. I joked a lot during the shutdown, when someone asked how I was doing, that I was “bored and broke,” because it sounded cute. In reality, I and my family did all right. My biggest worries were for my colleagues, especially those who are younger and those who have financial instabilities that made them vulnerable. Because we live in the world of listicles, here are my top 10 lessons learned during the Great Shutdown of 2018-2019:

1. Though I already appreciated my husband for what he does around the house, that appreciation intensified. He works from home and shoulders more than his share of household responsibility. While I wasn’t working, I lifted most of that away from him… and it was a LOT. I appreciate the labor he does and recognize how lucky I am that he does it.
2. Financial planning matters. We have saved and budgeted to absorb single-income status at least temporarily, if needed. Our pantry and freezer were stocked. The cushion was enough that we didn’t have to make the sacrifices or face the very real threats to our shelter, bills, and food that many of my colleagues did. We never missed a meal or a payment.
3. I had enough to do. In fact, I still had a long list of tasks that remain (and will remain) undone. Some were dreaded tasks, some were new and exciting ideas. Their time will come.
4. I had to keep a routine in order to remain engaged in my life. I took the little guy to school at a mostly regular time, worked out, set office times and chores times, and kept a running list of things to do. The routine kept me from turning into an endlessly-tweeting-and-Facebook-posting pile of mush.
5. Generosity comes from unexpected (and expected) places. Colleagues and friends across the country. A stranger who I helped talk through a hurricane evacuation strategy in a Facebook group. Much younger coworkers. Seasoned mentors. Sometimes the generosity had a monetary value; sometimes it was an accepted offer, sometimes not, and sometimes it was a gift that left me no option to accept or not. Every bit of the generosity went straight to my heart. Every single act of generosity meant so much to me. I will acknowledge it back and pay it forward.
6. Stress amplifies emotions. Kindness from others makes me cry, especially in a vulnerable emotional state. So does accepting help and gifts. You never saw it, and likely you never will, but I acknowledge it now. Sometimes, being around my family more than usual made me irritable toward them, even though #1 above applies to my husband and my son is about as adorable and kind and charming as they come. Sometimes I was irrationally angry at things I read in the news or on social media.
7. The longer the shutdown went on, the more anxious I became about the work load and pace when I go back. In our group, we can’t just ease back in to our jobs; we have to hit the ground running so that we can spin up the training for our colleagues that already has been postponed. I’m taking this weekend to be my last of zen.
8. The bill to guarantee back pay to furloughed federal workers was the single biggest stress reliever of the shutdown. I never felt safe and secure until it was signed.
9. I found myself playing the cheerleader role in our NWS discussion groups, to coworkers, and at least some of the time on Twitter. It felt right.
10. Communication is everything, especially coming from leaders in my agency. There were a couple of leaders up my chain of command (including WAY up) who went above and beyond to make sure their employees felt valued, informed, and supported. To those leaders (John Ogren and Tim Gallaudet, in particular), you demonstrated why you are in the positions you are, and while I already respected you, that respect increases even more. That’s the kind of leadership that makes worker bees like me want to give it our all when we get back. Even more, it makes me want to emulate that kind of leadership to my own colleagues and coworkers.

Has it all been wasted time? I hope not. I worked hard to make it count – to do things that would matter when it was over. Time will tell if I look back and feel like I used the time wisely.

And now, it’s time to hit the ground running!

Much of the federal government has been “shut down” (unpaid) for a month now, and of course, it has had direct impact on my everyday life. Yes, I’ll get paid when this cruel shutdown is over, but right now, there is no foreseeable end in sight. We are (normally) a two-income household, and one of us is still getting paid, so we are luckier than many. Even still, we have to be careful with our choices and tighten the belt substantially. Here is a glimpse into what has changed for me since it began.

Food. We are using up pantry and deep freeze items, including the stuff that has been in there a long time for a reason. That Kix cereal my little guy wanted because it had Paw Patrol on the box but didn’t actually like? Forcing myself to eat it before I buy myself a new box of cereal. I’ve already used up frozen leftover Thanksgiving mashed potatoes and Christmas ham (making shepherd’s pies and split pea soup, respectively). I buy far fewer fresh fruits and vegetables, because I don’t want to waste money by having them spoil. The things like pasta and potatoes that we are using up aren’t necessarily the healthiest, either. It’s widely known that low-income households eat less healthy, and this is one reason why. Our grocery list has been whittled to the essentials.

Health. I have chronic illnesses that require continual care, My treatment right now includes multiple modes of physician-recommended physical therapy, on an ongoing basis, along with periodic medical appointments. I’ve had to knock back my main physical therapy to once per week and discontinue the other two therapies until I am paid again. The last time I did that, my pain and mobility issues degenerated so much that I am still feeling the effects a year or two later. I postponed refilling some medication from December to January so that the new Flexible Spending Account year would kick in and cover the costs. The dentist told me that I need a crown, but it definitely will have to wait. Luckily, he thinks we are in time to save the tooth.  So far.

On the optimistic side, I do have more time to make physical exercise a more routine part of my day. That said, it’s actually harder for me to get a routine going now. When I’m working, I have to run early in the morning, because it is my only guaranteed window of time. Now, I can tell myself that I can run anytime, which makes it much easier to procrastinate and then lose my chance. I’m working on forcing myself to a running schedule despite an absence of other scheduling in my life.

Travel. Our gift to our little guy for his birthday is an Amtrak trip and overnight hotel stay, pretty much solely for the purpose of the Amtrak ride. He’s big into trains, you see. Because it isn’t tied to a specific event, because he has been patient, and because it’s not a necessary cost right now, we have postponed the trip (which would have been this weekend). Imagine, relying on your 4-year-old’s patience when telling him that you don’t know when we get to go on the train.

That’s the first to fall, but there are more. Sending my Chiefs fan of a husband to a playoff game wasn’t even something we could seriously consider, though we would have under normal circumstances. It’s time to book accommodations for our summer trip to Michigan, but I’m putting it off to avoid paying deposits. I have a LauraPalooza conference to attend on my own dime this summer, and again, it’s time to book things like flights, but I’m putting it off. Some of these will be done when paychecks return, but it could cost me in higher prices for flights and reduced availability of already scant options for lodging in Michigan.

Activities. Some locations in our area are beginning to offer free admittance to (furloughed) federal employees. We attended a home and garden show this weekend, though our free tickets were from a mail offer rather than my furloughed status. We have circled the Harlem Globetrotters on our calendar, and on a good-weather weekend day, we can head to the zoo. We also have spent a couple of weekend afternoons at the library – though, to be honest, we would have done that, anyway. It just helps that it’s always free. The search for free activities started slowly but has been mounting.

We have maintained a few bits of normalcy, though. We had a couple of quick road trips over the holidays to visit family and friends that we kept. We have had a date night or two, because nurturing our marriage still is of high priority. I guess that means we have areas where we can still tighten the belt if we start feeling a greater pinch.

Mental health and coping. Being home this much is not normal for me, and I am out of sorts. My moods have ranged from irritable to sad to my usual cheery self. The house is the cleanest and most organized it has been in years, and yet I feel like I’m just roaming through the days and not accomplishing anything of note with all of this time. Many of the days just seem to disappear in a haze of running errands, cooking, cleaning, and web surfing. I’m aware that I’m spending too much time on social media, and yet I feel drawn to it as a way to connect with my colleagues across the country. I’ve been seeking opportunities for side income since about the second week of the shutdown, and the one that I found may give me more purpose and value again. It’s not enough, though.

How am I doing? I appreciate everyone who has asked me that directly. My quippy answer is, “Broke and bored!” My serious answer is that I’m fine. And I am. I’m staying busy and doing my best to find opportunities to socialize outside our home. We are OK financially – not ideal, but we aren’t facing the hardships of many of my colleagues. We are cutting corners but not suffering. We recognize the privilege of our position. And yet, my world is unstable. Every day, I wait and watch for word that there will be an end in sight, and I am let down. Every day, I tally the work that will wait for me when I return to work and how big of a hurdle it will be to spin back up. My world begs for its routine to be restored, and with this much daily uncertainty, I can’t get one established in the interim. My energy and skills are being wasted, and resources are being wasted. How far will they deteriorate by the time I return?

And then the TV broke. Damn.

In my nearly-17-year career with the federal government, I have now experienced shutdowns both as an “excepted” employee (required to work through it but not paid until it’s over) and a furloughed employee. A colleague asked me which one is harder, from my perspective.

They both suck. They suck differently, but they suck. Let’s break it down.

As an excepted employee, you must show up to work every day. Your back pay is guaranteed, but you won’t get paid for your work until the shutdown ends and payroll is processed. The civil servants who are excepted are often on front-line jobs: weather forecasters, NASA mission staff, TSA security workers, even the Coast Guard. Most of them serve public safety in some way or another. A shutdown asks them to work in a limited “business-as-usual” form, doing their primary functions but often barred from taking training, conducting research, working on special projects, or traveling.

Excepted employees are told that if they take leave, they will be placed in furlough status. Different agencies, managers, and shutdowns handle the status differently. Sometimes, the excepted employees are told they cannot return to work status once they take furlough; other times, they may flex between the two. Guidance in advance is never clear, and excepted employees are advised to cancel leave. Should they take their leave and move into furlough status, their predicament matches their furloughed colleagues.

Furloughed employees are not allowed to come to their buildings, check their emails, or conduct any work activities, even from home. They may not conduct work-related activities, including speaking at conferences or taking training, on their personal time if the work would have been a part of their “on the clock” duties. Their back pay is not guaranteed, though in every shutdown prior to the Great Shutdown of 2018-2019, their backpay has been approved. It does require an act passed by both the House and the Senate, then signed by the President. The behavior of both the recent Congress and the recent President has not always matched precedent, so until this bill is signed, furloughed employees live in a world of uncertainty about their pay.

Both excepted and furloughed employees carry added emotional and mental burdens. Excepted employees face working only some parts of their jobs, with inconsistent guidance about what they may or may not do while working. They feel unappreciated. They are frustrated because they are not eligible for unemployment due to their work status, nor do they typically have time to pursue other paying work because they are still reporting for their jobs.

Furloughed employees feel dismissed and marginalized, sometimes even by their own colleagues. They usually support mission-critical functions, though perhaps in a less immediate role than their excepted colleagues, but are signaled that their work is not important. They see their excepted colleagues receiving public accolades and food deliveries for their service, and they know they would be happy to be in their colleague’s shoes and helping and maybe eating a little more if they only were allowed. Many face steep work and learning curves when they return to duties that have piled up in their absence, causing stress both during the shutdown and afterwards that can linger for months or longer. Their uncertainty about pay status can be particularly troubling.

So, let’s be clear. Being excepted is not just “business as usual,” and being furloughed is not a “paid vacation.” They are burdensome and stressful, and both detract from the mission of the agencies and needs of the citizens that these civil servants serve. Nobody wins. Nobody is worse, and nobody is better. But, and this cannot be emphasized enough, we are all in it together.

Being in the world of Wilder Weather means reading into the mind of a federal employee. We can’t help but ponder the shutdown situation, and I want to check in from the world of the shutdown. As we enter the third week of the federal government shutdown, it’s time to check in on the health of our federal furloughed and excepted employees.

Furloughed feds first. For the last two weeks, with the holidays and the likelihood that many of you had some leave scheduled already, it might have been almost transparent that you were furloughed. Some “tells” have given it away, though. You didn’t turn in a timesheet. You may have had upcoming travel canceled, and you might be starting to miss calls or webinars that were on your calendar. Your partners are probably back into their work routines, and the kids are back to school now. Maybe the big to-do items on your list already got done. In short, this is probably the first week that being furloughed really starts to hit home.

What are your plans for this week? “They” say to do your best to keep your schedule. The extra rest is welcome, but do get up and moving in the morning, and go to bed at a relatively normal time. Here are some other ideas for things to do to help fill your days:

1. Exercise. You know that exercise you put off because you didn’t have time? You’ll never have a better time to start the habit.
2. Read. Libraries are free, and they’re filled with books you haven’t read yet. It doesn’t matter if it’s a trashy romance novel, a dense biography, a book related to your profession, or a YA you’ve secretly wanted to read.
3. Get out. Especially if you’re an extrovert. Text a friend or coworker and meet up – over coffee or lunch if your budget allows, or for a walk or chat at someone’s home if you are stretched thin.
4. Cook. It’s a great time to stock up the freezer with meals, to make that recipe that takes 3 hours of simmer or roasting time, or to use up what’s in your pantry.
5. Make lists, plans, or idea bubbles. If you just can’t get your brain away from your job (or don’t want to), start collecting your thoughts on what you’ll attack and how once you’re back to work, once the shutdown is lifted. We’re all going to be slammed when we get back, and the prep work will help you dive back in.
6. Create. Write, draw, sculpt, woodwork, knit, paint, sing, dance, play, or do whatever it is that scratches your creative itch and taps your artistic side. The act of creating a tangible something can be therapeutic.
7. Tune out social media and news. At least for a while. Put down the computer and log out of the apps, if you must. It’s very tempting to follow the daily swells of political debates, the activities of conferences you’re missing, the tales and travails of your colleagues. Let yourself do it for a window of time. Then put it down and walk away. Do something else – anything else. At least for a while.

I’ve seen one too many of these this week, and I can’t keep my itchy feet off my soapbox any longer.

Stop taking tornado selfies. Just stop. They are tacky and tasteless.  They make a caricature of a harmful event and of you.  They are perceived as cheesy and thoughtless at best, selfish and arrogant by many, and downright rude and heartless to those whose lives are impacted by the tornado over your shoulder.

I am a storm chaser myself, and I appreciate the awe and majesty and raw power of tornado thunderstorms.  Chasing is hard, and I also appreciate the effort and achievement of creating a forecast and making driving decisions that come together to bring you to see a thunderstorm and then a tornado develop.  I get it.

Many of us celebrate in at least some small way when the forecast combines with our positioning to allow us to witness the birth, maturity, and demise of a (tornadic) thunderstorm.  What separates the classy from the cheesy/selfish/rude is how we celebrate and why.  I am never celebrating that a tornado strikes homes, cars, fields, lives. As I have said before, a tornado will form or not form regardless of whether I am there and whether I want to see it or not. But I do celebrate my ability to forecast a single thunderstorm within a drivable range of distance. That kind of pinpoint forecasting is difficult, and doing this as a hobby reinforces my ability to forecast storms in my job.

Public celebration of the occurrence of a tornado will always rub some (many) people the wrong way.  Jumping up and down, cheering, and yes, posing for pictures in front of it are all perceived as immature or disrespectful.  Like the good mentors say to guys scoring touchdowns in football, act like you’ve been there before and will get there again.  Call it storm chasing sportsmanship.

Yes, we have free speech in this country, but it does not free you from judgment based on your speech.  You can say or post whatever you want.  There is, however, a code of ethics and morals and conduct that govern us as a society and a smaller component of us who choose this hobby. You don’t block roads to take pictures, you don’t drive unsafely to get to a storm… and you don’t disrespect the weather event itself by being a cheesy smiling face in front of it.  If you do, I won’t be the only one who judges you.

How would you have felt if you took a smiling selfie of the El Reno tornado at the moment it was killing three of our own?  A moment like that could happen again, and you wouldn’t know it at the time you took the photo, perhaps not before you plaster it on Facebook.

When it comes to pictures, as in the treatment of Nature itself, please get out of the way of Nature. Show us the storm, not your smiling face in front of it.  (You’re blocking our view of the storm, anyway, and that’s what we really want to see.) Keep your selfies off of social media.  Show respect to the storm itself and the harm it can inflict.

(Written late September 2015, with a later postscript)

If I had known the last time you nursed would be the last time, I would have held you longer after you fell asleep.  I might have tried to take a picture.

Babies never self-wean before a year of age.  Knowing that, and knowing that my grace period for nursing and pumping would be difficult to extend past a year, I had been planning ahead on how to ease away from breastfeeding for that magic one-year mark.  I knew I would have to slowly ease away from the pump, dropping a session at a time.  I figured that we could still nurse occasionally, if you asked for it, but that I would be free of pumping baggage by that one-year birthday and hopefully down to just one nursing session a day, if you needed it, and easing our way to being fully weaned.

You’re a heartbreaker, though, and you’re as independent as your parents.  At just over 8 months old, you decided that you’re not a baby anymore and that it was time for you to move on from nursing.

It felt sudden at the time, but like most relationships that end, the signs were there before I could see them.  Your nursing sessions were shorter, and your attention to nursing was easily broken.  Daddy couldn’t even be in the room when we nursed most of the time.  Instead of your usual 20 to 30 minutes or more of nursing, we were lucky to get 5 to 10 minutes.  I blamed your age, with its distractibility, and my work schedule that kept us apart for many nursing sessions, including my favorite morning ones.

And then you got sick.  With a fever of 103 degrees or higher for three days, you again sought comfort at the breast.  As your fever broke and a rash broke out to replace it, you still were not yourself, and you clung to me and nursed more.  My nipples were raw from accumulated pump damage, but I gritted my teeth and let you have as much time as you needed, never showing you that soothing you was painful to me.

When you felt better, you literally hit the ground running, up on your feet and holding our hands to explore and expand your world.  I love watching you find something new, and your sense of adventure reminds me of my own.  Like a switch, when you felt better, you simply were not interested in nursing.  You turned away from the breast, arching or twisting your back, and whining or crying as I tried to coax you to take nourishment. I handed you to your daddy to give a bottle, while I left the room and cried so that you wouldn’t see me.

The less you nursed, the more I cried.  I can’t remember the last time I was so emotional, so devastated by a loss.  I simply wasn’t ready. I thought we had more time.  I thought I had some choice in the timeline.  I hadn’t realized how important our nursing time had become to me until that need was no longer fulfilled.

Your nursing strike went from days to weeks.  I consulted lactation experts and other breastfeeding moms in every venue I could find — Facebook groups, La Leche League meetings, calls to the certified lactation consultants.  They suggested everything from changing positions to holding you near the breast while feeding a bottle to making you uncomfortable during a bottle.  We spun in a chair and we bathed together, both of which were great fun to you but did not draw you back to the breast.

The last time I nursed you was on a Friday evening, September 25, when you were 38.5 weeks old.  My girlfriends were visiting, and Daddy was out of town, so I was giving the evening bottle.  A lactation consultant had suggested slipping you from bottle to breast as you were falling asleep at the end of that evening feeding, and I did. For about a minute, you latched and nursed yourself the rest of the way to sleep. In your sleep, you held on about a minute more.  Two minutes.  I held you close, not wanting to end the moment, afraid I would burst into tears and wake you up.  At the time, those were tears of relief that you might be ending your strike.  It turns out that you were saying goodbye.

Nobody writes songs or poems about this kind of heartbreak.  Few mommy bloggers talk about baby-driven self-weaning.  Nursing moms avoid talking about early self-weaning like they avoid contagious baby-kissers, as though acknowledging it could curse them into living it.  I get it; breastfeeding is hard enough without dwelling on all that can go wrong.  It would be reassuring, at least a little, to know that there are other mothers who have felt this way, other babies asserting their independence ahead of schedule.

Your pediatrician and our last lactation consultant both suggested what I feared and dreaded — that you were not the usual baby on a usual timeline. You were a toddler in a baby’s body, ready to eat solid foods and run on your unsteady feet, ready to be done with baby things like breastfeeding and tummy time.

I haven’t given up trying to entice you to the breast, but I have given up hoping that you will return and certain that you will spend enough time there to draw your nourishment.  It is a necessary step for me, so that I can move past the grief stages and into our next phase.  I imagine that I’ll continue to offer the breast as long as I’m pumping and lactating, because I know the milk is there if you want it.  It does make me wonder if you’ll forget how to nurse.  When does that muscle memory fade for you?

I feel cheated and robbed.  Our last few breastfeeding months were stolen from me, taken without warning. Instead of seeing your bright blue eyes and smiling mouth, I now stare down at the cold plastic pump that will help me nourish you for another few months.  I grieve the loss of our nursing relationship like no other loss I’ve felt before.

Nine months ago, I had to learn how to hold you to my breast to feed you life, to nurture you, to share affection. Now, I have to learn all over again how to feed and nurture and love you without nursing you.  I’m lost, but I suspect you’ll help me find a way.

— Postscript —

Sometimes, wishes are granted, even if it happens in the smallest of ways.  I continued to try to coax you back to the breast into October, never pushing, but always offering.  If I was giving you a bottle, I had a breast out. If I was rocking you to sleep, I kept you nuzzled to my chest.  On the evening of October 13, you were a little fussier than usual. I placed you in your favorite nursing position, got out the shield, and offered one more time. And you took it.  This time, however, I was prepared.  I took pictures and deep breaths, while trying to move as little as possible and being present in the moment as much as I could.  You nursed for five minutes, and then we let go.

This time, in my heart, I knew it was the last.  I offered less and less, and you never took the breast again (except for one vicious new-teeth chomp somewhere around 11 months old, but that hardly counts as nursing!).  You couldn’t give me back our nursing relationship, but you gave me a chance to say good bye and have closure with it.  You gave me what you could, and with all my heart, I accepted your gift.

Baby boy, I will cherish that five minutes forever.

The abrupt weaning taught me some valuable lessons that I hope I never forget as you grow older:  to be present and in the moment, to enjoy and find the best in each phase because it might pass us by soon, and to let go and let you grow when you are ready to move up a stage.

Waving good-bye to breastfeeding. Our very last session, on Tuesday, October 13, at 6:17 PM CDT.

(Note:  I wrote this on June 29, 2015.)

Today I comforted you.

On the eve of your six month birthday, your evening routine is well established.  We go from play time and giggles quickly into pajamas and a book, because you will rapidly descend into hunger for your evening nightcap bottle.  You still are breastfed, but we’ve been giving you an evening bottle since you were about a month old, partly because Daddy wanted to help and partly because you sleep better.  Seven ounces later (your evening appetite is huge!), you doze off in Daddy’s arms, and he holds you maybe a minute or two longer than needed before tucking you into your crib in a loose swaddle.

This evening was different.  After your 7-ounce nightcap, instead of settling, you wailed.  Sometimes your cry means that your hunger wasn’t satiated, and we add a little more to your bottle to top it off.  But you wanted nothing to do with the topper; you rejected it and wailed.  Your trusty Wubbanub wasn’t comforting.  Daddy swayed with you held to his chest, facing out, the way you’ve liked to be held when you’re fussy since you were a newborn.  You paused, watched the dog, looked around, and wailed again.

I was in the kitchen getting ready to go to work, but hearing you cry so hard made my arm hairs prickle and raised a lump in my throat.  Mommy instinct got the better of me, and I ventured up to your room to offer my help to your daddy.  He said that the one thing he couldn’t try, the one comfort you might want, was to be nursed.

I held you to my chest.

And today I comforted you.

Nursing has always been a little more on the practical side than the emotional side for me.  The first few weeks were a struggle as we fought issues with latching and tongue tie and oversupply and satiating your hunger.  To this day, we still wear a shield to protect each other, a thin film of plastic between you and me that signals it is time to nurse.  The early struggles made me wonder where that magical glow of nursing was, when it would appear.

Mama and baby with a post-nursing snooze, 6/27/15.

There are glimmers of that magic, though, as we grow together.  I see it in your smiles when you looked up at me from the breast.  I certainly see it in your sweet milk-drunk face when you nurse yourself to sleep, with a full belly and full lips and glistening cheeks and chin.  I even see it in the adorably vicious way you dive into and attack my chest when you’re hungry.

My favorite nursing session is the first one of the morning, when you’re smiling and eager to greet the day. My second favorite is any one after we’ve been apart from each other all day.  In the midst of those busy evenings, we slow down and reconnect, probably developing a good habit that has been a long time coming for this overcommitted working mother who is still trying to squeeze in extra deadlines.

When I transitioned back to work after 12 weeks at home, nursing sessions gave way as I developed a relationship with a cold plastic pump.  My milk is important to you, and I work hard for it.  On most working days, I only nurse you once or twice, and the rest of my milk comes to you in a bottle as you are in day care or daddy care or taking that last bottle of the day.  I find myself missing nursing, sad when I spend more time with the pump than with you.  I can tell you miss it, too, because you dive for the breast when we get home, even if you aren’t terribly hungry.

We relax together in those nursing sessions, after those early weeks of being tense and worried.

But today I comforted you.

Sure, you’ve comfort-nursed before. Those sessions started as a feeding, but the real intent masqueraded beneath the light snack, as you clung to the breast for my nearness, often alternating dozing and gentle suckling.

Today, there was no masquerade.  Your purpose was clear.  You took the breast with no intent of eating, just to hold me near.  Your cries quieted instantly, your eyes grew heavy, and your rapid clenching and unclenching of the cottony cowl-neck fabric of my shirt relaxed as your hands fell to your sides.  You were there only for comfort.

And today I comforted you.

I held you long past the point where you fell asleep, because I wanted to be sure you were completely soothed.  When I gave the nod, your daddy, sitting on the floor next to us to be of assistance at a moment’s notice, lifted you from me and tucked you into your crib in a loose swaddle.

We quietly faded out of your room and into the kitchen so that I could finish getting ready for work and he could get ready for bed. I floated down those stairs, and I’m sure that I was glowing.

Because today I comforted you.

And pay the fiddler, we have!

Being the proud parents of a now one-year-old little boy, working rotating shifts now opposite of each other instead of aligned with each other, and balancing our new lives and responsibilities has cost my husband and me precious time.  We used to work for hours at home (either together or in parallel) on writing, research, and extra projects.  With the baby’s arrival, we lost our opportunities for those quiet times working at home, our arms now full of an energetic bundle of joy and drool and giggles and poop and milk.  They tell you that you’ll get that time back again, and they’re right.  They didn’t tell you that you won’t get your brain back – that the ability to concentrate and focus on projects is forever short-circuited by worrying about what the baby is eating and drinking, whether he will sleep, and if that cough or sneeze is benign or the beginning of a serious illness.

I’ve written some thoughts in the last year, despite the lack of time – really at the highest and lowest of some emotions.  I didn’t post them here because I was trying to keep this blog close to the topics of weather and Laura.  But if not here, then where?  This is my podium.  So, at least for a little while, I’m going to post a few things I wrote last year – out of the sequence of my current life, but things I feel strongly enough to express.

If you’re here for the Wilder and the weather, hang in there – this is me trying to get my brain and fingers back in shape for a little dabbling in writing.  If you’re here to get to know me better, you’re about to do just that.

Thanks for listening!

Family photo near the little guy’s 6-month birthday!

Not a peep on the Wilder Weather blog for 6 months?  Where have you been?!

Laura had a whirl of gaiety in her Little Town days.  My last six months can be described only as a blizzard of gaiety – an all-consuming, sensory-numbing spin from major event to major event with hardly a gasp of air in between and very little ability to see from one CRASH to the next BANG into major life milestones.

In summary:

Ph.D. graduation and hooding ceremony in August

1.  As of August, I am now a full doctorate, having completed my Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska in Natural Resource Sciences with a specialization in Climate Assessment and Impacts.  Whew, that’s a mouthful!  Let’s just call it a Ph.D. in Applied Climate for short.  My dissertation is titled “The Hard Winter of 1880-1881: Climatological Context and Communication via a Laura Ingalls Wilder Narrative” and is available online.  It ranges from deep into the science of weather and climate to an historical analysis of the Long Winter to brushing on topics like storytelling and surveys.

2. Hubby and I are expecting our own little Almanzo early this winter!

“A Rose in December (is) much rarer than a rose in June, and must be paid for accordingly.”

3.  I’ve had the opportunity at work to take a 3-month assignment that focuses more closely on climate and takes me off of forecasting.  The assignment splits my time among several locations while I am helping the National Weather Service get more climate information together that we can provide to our citizens.

4.  I have accepted a role as co-chair of the upcoming LauraPalooza 2015 conference!

I have a lot of topics percolating, and I’m so happy to have time here again!  Look out — I’m back!